One day I was walking down town with my friends. The day had been most uneventful. The sun was shining and overall, it had been a slow day. However, just as we were about to head back to my house, I saw something out of the corner of my eye. Something that made my palms sweaty, and my heart race.

On the other side of the street lived an old jagged metal fence condensed with colorful graffiti that was surrounded by mountains of tall green weeds. Beyond the beaten up metal, I saw two shadowy figures. Two teenage boys to be exact. They looked to be about 17 years old, I think. The smaller of two appeared to be lying on the ground touching the fence. The part of the fence he was touching looked like it was completely covered in with red paint. The other boy was standing right next to him. He had a large figure with a strong build.

“Hey,” I screamed to my best friend, “something is going on behind that fence. We need to go and make sure everything’s okay! I have a bad feeling about it. Let me have your cell phone just in case I need to—“

“Are you freaking crazy?” she interrupted. “I’m not going behind there! Somebody else will check it out. We don’t have to! I mean come on, if something really bad was happening back there, why didn't anybody else do anything, huh? I’m sure it’s nothing anyway.”

I just stood there with a look of bewilderment on my face. I was frozen right there, feeling as if I had just been slapped. My other friends didn't even move. My god, what was wrong with them? What could I say, what could I do?

Reluctantly, I kept my mouth shut for the rest of the way back. I knew I would never get my way, so I did not protest for long. I couldn’t stop thinking about what I seen though. I felt sick everywhere. I attempted to go to sleep that night, with a painful guilt picking at me.

And then, it happened. The bomb had been dropped. The next day, the top news story was on a 17 year old boy who had been assaulted down town. Right behind that fence. During the time the boy had been killed and left behind the fence, experts estimated that at least ten people saw him or saw the assaulter leave the scene…and nobody said a word because they just assumed that somebody else would. If somebody had just picked up their cell phone and dialed 9-1-1 before it was too late then maybe, just maybe he could have been alive today.

“Oh my gosh,” I screamed at the top of my lungs. “What have I done?”

Nothing…I did nothing. All because of the bystander effect.